France’s President Emmanuel Macron has hosted a high-level meeting of heads of state and business leaders alongside his Kenyan counterpart, William Ruto, as Paris continues to pivot to other parts of the continent due to its strained relations with French-speaking West African countries.

The conference, which was held on Monday and Tuesday in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, was France’s first Africa summit in an English-speaking country.

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Due to colonialism, French influence on the continent has been strongest in central and West African Francophone countries, which include those in the arid Sahel region separating the Sahara from the coastal…